DETROIT — Matt Eberflus is done. His future as Bears head coach has been bleak for weeks, but there’s no coming back from the way he bungled the final sequence of the Bears’ 23-20 loss to the Lions on Thursday.
He threw away the Bears’ shot at tying or winning the game by doing nothing as the clock ran out with him still holding his last timeout. Rookie quarterback Caleb Williams felt he didn’t have the authority to use one in that scenario, leaving him completely — and hopelessly — dependent on Eberflus to manage the clock correctly.
Lions players streamed onto the field as the clock expired, and the Bears were bewildered, unaware at first that their coach botched their shot at a landmark comeback.
Down 23-7 in the fourth quarter, Williams rallied the Bears and got his chance to pull off the upset starting inside his own 1-yard line on the final possession. He got the Bears as far as the Lions’ 13-yard line before everything unraveled.
He eventually got sacked at the Lions’ 41 with 32 seconds left, and the clock kept ticking as Eberflus stood by. Williams got the Bears to the line of scrimmage with 13 seconds remaining and snapped it with six left. He threw deep down the right side for Rome Odunze, and it fell incomplete with no time on the clock.
Unbelievably, or perhaps totally believably if you’ve been listening to Eberflus explain his errors the last few weeks, he defended his inaction and said, “I like what we did there… I think we handled it the right way.”
No one agreed. The Bears cannot keep going down this path with him for another week.
The mood in the visiting locker room at Ford Field was decidedly resigned. If there was fury or shock, it didn’t show.
One player shook his head as he walked out the door and muttered mutedly, “[Expletive].” Another wondered flatly, “What the [expletive]?” A third was asked what he thinks will happen Friday at Halas Hall and replied genuinely, “No idea. What do you think?”
It’s time. Firing Eberflus is inevitable, so it’s best to forgo any delay.
Ahead of the Lions game the Bears were still evaluating Eberflus on a weekly basis and had made no decision on his future, a source said.
The Bears have a longstanding unwritten policy of not firing a head coach during the season and haven’t ever done it, but Eberflus has forced them into a position where that absolutely is possible. It will be legitimately considered, and in the aftermath of his self-sabotage in the loss to the Lions, it’s the right call.
It won’t save the season. That’s over. But the losses have mounted far too high, the missteps have been egregious, the morale in the locker room has disintegrated and it is now overwhelmingly clear that he won’t be the Bears’ coach next season. There’s no point in another day under those circumstances.